


Resentment

by cruisedirector



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M, Lovesickness, One-sided Conversation, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2000-12-31
Updated: 2000-12-31
Packaged: 2017-10-05 13:10:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/42087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cruisedirector/pseuds/cruisedirector
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chakotay talks about the nature of love with the Doctor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Resentment

**Author's Note:**

> I don't really know where this story came from and it doesn't really sound a thing like Chakotay, but he insisted I write it down anyway.

Sure, I'll talk about it. Why the hell not? It isn't what everybody thinks. I realize that everyone around here thinks I'm stupid - especially Tuvok - but I can't believe you all could think I was that stupid. Don't patronize me, I know what you mean even if it's not what you said...

It's kind of funny how stupid you all think we are, because we used to laugh about how stupid the crew was for never figuring it out. You know which we. She and I. Back at the very beginning, before she got overwhelmed with guilt or duty or whatever it was, we thought it was hilarious the way everyone assumed we weren't doing anything just because they never found any concrete evidence. Actually, she thought it was funnier than I ever did. I never understood why we had to keep it a secret. But it didn't bother me so much when it was "our secret," you know? Only when I realized she intended for it always to be a secret, which meant it was never going to go anywhere...

She enjoyed lying about it and seeing if she could get away with it. Don't tell me she's not like that, I know better. She enjoyed lying to Q, who's supposed to know everything. "There isn't another man." And I had to play along, over and over. Hey, did you know? I bet she lied at her physicals when you asked whether she was having sexual relations, didn't she. Don't get huffy, she would have lied to Tuvok in a security check. She sometimes blocked the bridge sensors when she was in my quarters. You don't believe me, do you? She made sure we were so careful; if she was scheduled to be in sickbay we didn't do anything for a week. Go back and look at the DNA records and you'll see. All that time she was sleeping with me, not a person aboard really suspected, even when they all thought maybe...

See? I told you. Yes, Doctor, I lied to you too. Sorry. Hmm. I didn't resent the lying, I resented how stupid it made me look. She could never see it - she laughed at me when I told her everyone thought I was mooning over her. She thought the lying was necessary. I'm still not sure why; she had a whole bunch of reasons about regulations and crew morale but none of them made that much sense. Crew morale couldn't possibly have been worse than it got after we broke up. What do you think? You're programmed with the whole damn Starfleet ethical database, you must have some opinion. If you were captain of a starship and you decided to have an affair with a member of your crew, would you insist on keeping it a secret? Would that make it less of a breach of protocol? Goddamn it! I know it isn't technically a breach of protocol! Try telling her that...

I'm not angry. Well, I'm not angry at you. Sorry about that. Angry's not the right word anyway. I'm frustrated. More than two years. It was pretty much over when Seven came on board. Really since the first time we encountered Borg, but I wasn't admitting it to myself then. Her? Nah. She was relieved. By then she already wanted me out of her hair. The funny thing is, I think she didn't want to give up the sex. That was the one thing she thought we weren't supposed to do, but it was the last thing she wanted to let go...

Don't ask me. I don't know. Actually, I think I do know why, but it doesn't really have to do with sex so I'm probably wrong. I think she thought that if we were lovers, I would develop expectations, or something. That I would get possessive. She thought I would resent the time she had to spend on the ship and the crew. Stupid. I had just as many obligations as she did. Maybe she resented that. It doesn't matter. She thought I would try to take her away from her duties, as if she didn't trust me to know better...

Look, Doctor, you're a hologram with limited personal experience, I don't expect you to see it the way I do. I'm not an experiment and you're not a counselor. Could you keep your comments to yourself? All right. Fine. You want to know the truth? Yes, I resented the amount of time she spent on the ship and the crew. I resented it before we went to bed together, when she was just my friend. Go ahead and tell me I'm selfish, because it's irrelevant. I knew she was driving herself crazy - we both saw where it ended up, with her going to the other extreme and locking herself in her quarters for days on end because she couldn't deal with any of it. Tuvok practically suggested that I try to get her to come out of it, if you know what I mean. No, no, that was long after it was over. By then I don't know if he knew or not. Well, yes it might have, but I'm her first officer, not her - I don't even want to think about what the word is! You think I never heard anyone say that about me? The handful of people who suspected we might actually be doing it - that she might actually do it, the high and mighty - the crewmembers who thought maybe we did it thought I was stupidest of all...

When we were stranded together with that virus. I meant to tell you, it was cute that you packed contraceptive boosters. No, she went ballistic when she first saw them! Afterwards she thought you and Kes would be able to tell, but neither of you said anything or put anything into our records. I thought people would be able to tell just from looking at me. Not smiling - the first few weeks after we got back, she wouldn't even come near me.

Of course I tried, but all I seemed to be able to do was start arguments with her. Every time we talked she would tell me about everyone else she needed to go see, and all the work she had to do, and I would ask her to sit with me for a few minutes but it never lasted very long. I was walking around with tears in my eyes. I'm sure she did think I was being unreasonable but we'd been alone together for four months - our relationship had changed. We were working more collaboratively. It was hard for me to go back to my office and not be able to yell out to her when I wanted her opinion on something. To have to make appointments to see her! You think I'm unreasonable to have resented that? It ended up not mattering because it changed...

The Kazon. It's funny - I thought that was going to be the end, I thought it would be her excuse for deciding it was too dangerous or whatever. Instead she gradually started relaxing around me. Then when we ended up in that temporal disaster and wound up back on Earth three hundred years ago, all of a sudden it seemed less important in the grand scheme of things, you know? Q helped - the fact that he really didn't seem to know. She thought that if we could get past him, we could get past anyone. We really had a nice few months. Couldn't you tell? Wasn't I walking around with a stupid smile on my face? I felt like I was...

Because she almost died. And then I guess I took it too far. I told her how I felt - yes, but I don't think I was as intense, or something. I never told her what it would mean to me to lose her. Something went wrong that night. We were drinking wine and I was pouring my heart out, and all of a sudden she started pulling back from me. Then that whole mess with B'Elanna and Vorick and B'Elanna and Tom - that got to her in some way I don't understand. I thought maybe it was Tuvok, she knows that sooner or later he's going to have to deal with pon farr and he might not survive it. I don't know if she feels some obligation, since she blames herself for stranding him out here, if she thinks she should have to...you know. But it was also B'Elanna and Tom getting together and the crew knowing. I suggested to her that it might be time. She slapped me down hard...

The Borg collective, that one was my fault. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She was so distant, we hadn't made love in weeks, and I was angry and lonely, and hurt - I wasn't thinking clearly. I can't believe she couldn't see that. Actually I think she did see it, she just resented it. The weakness more than what I did with Riley Frasier. Nothing was ever the same after that. We tried, but she didn't try very hard, and then she brought Seven on board, and all of a sudden Seven was her companion on her holodeck excursions and on all the away teams...

What? Seven? Is she what this is all about? Oh, god, Doc. No, I don't dislike her, I barely know her...you should be talking to the captain about her, not me. Ha! Yes, it is funny. You thinking you couldn't talk to the captain because she hasn't had a relationship for five years is very, very funny. Unfortunately no one but me would get the joke. How long have you...oh, this is pretty recent...

Why don't you just tell her? Well, yes, that's always a risk, but I've always believed that what you gain in love is greater than what you risk...I think I told Neelix that once. Stupid. It's better to know. Do you remember that time I asked you to check my memory engrams because I found a long note I wrote to myself about a love affair I couldn't remember? I wish I remembered, even if it ended terribly. That doesn't sound much like me in the writing, though. I'm a terrible writer. I wonder what she did to me that made me forget I was already in love...

It was. It had been over for awhile, but that didn't mean I wasn't still in love. Not the breakup, why would I resent that? I'm the one who ended it. Yes. Don't look so surprised. How long could you stand to live like that? Actually not until after we got those letters from home. For a minute all of a sudden, she sounded...open to something. She said some pretty strange stuff about how Mark was her excuse for not having any real relationships out here. Hmm? I don't remember. Something about how she had plenty of time to decide. God. Angry isn't the word. I was...Doctor, don't make me remember. I was happy. I was very happy. Until I realized nothing had changed. Then I just couldn't stand it anymore...

Don't ask me that. No. Listen, it's not that I wouldn't tell you, it's that I don't want to tell me. Because I can't afford to. I need to have a working relationship with her. Don't you understand? I can't afford to hate her, but I have to hate her when you ask me that question. If I let go of that, what's left...

Stop it. Don't analyze me. I know, I know, I know. No, I won't say it. You know why. For the same reason you won't tell Seven. If you said it to her and she rejected you, don't you think you'd try to talk yourself out of the feeling? You'd do anything to believe you were wrong. No! I don't wish I could take any of it back. I just sometimes wish I could forget it, because I keep wanting to remember it. Doesn't some civilization somewhere in your memory banks have a cure? Somebody must have figured out a way...

Well, Doc, that can be your contribution to medicine. You can be the man who cured lovesickness. The whole galaxy will thank you. I'll be your guinea pig. We've already established that everyone thinks I'm stupid, right? Sure I can prove it. My advice to you is to tell Seven, before you start resenting her, because that never dies. You carry it around with you and it keeps reminding you. I think the day I can stop resenting Kathryn will be the day I finally stop...uh-uh. You're not going to get me to say that. Maybe you could just cure resentment.


End file.
